Sunday, January 20, 2008

Liquor Quik is a line of 20-milliliter bottles with concentrated flavors. Pour a bottle of Liquor Quik into a 750-milliliter bottle of grain alcohol or vodka, and you have amaretto, or hazelnut liqueur, or maybe Irish cream, or several others. Who thinks up this stuff?

I found Liquor Quik for $4.39 per bottle at Beach HomeBrew in The Galleria at 9612 North Kings Highway, Myrtle Beach.

"I made the Grand Marnier and I couldn't tell the difference," said Ed Waldorf, owner of Beach HomeBrew, referring to the orange-brandy flavored Liquor Quik flavor. Waldorf said he buys a mid-priced vodka from Sam's Club for his mixes, making the concoction less expensive ounce-for-ounce than buying the real Grand Marnier.

I'm a former section editor (business, later features) at The Sun News in Myrtle Beach, S.C. I'm also the former owner of the late Living Room Coffee Bar & Used Books. These days I'm a lecturer in English at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, S.C., and I'm formerly Beerman columnist and Strange Days columnist for the Weekly Surge.